A real King wears silver

04. Dezember 2016

The 15^th Single World Championships from 24^th to 27^th of November in Fürth (Germany) ended with the world number ones becoming World Champs in the Elite classes. Tournament Director Michael Eubel and his team made the World Champs a brilliant event with a smoothly running time schedule, a great venue with good conditions on more than enough courts and a great players’ dinner and party at the venue.

The Swiss flag was represented by our two elite players Nicole Eisler and Benjamin Hampl along with our experienced players Susan Rutschmann and Graham King, combacker Tanja Omlin and novices Marcel Fässler and Jörg Schmid.

Even though the Swiss delegation wasn’t that big, the support back home was amazing. Most of the elite matches were able to be seen from home through the livestream and all elite main round matches were offered for betting via a bookmaker for the first time since 2012. www.bethard.com is interested in Racketlon and in the future we should see more of this.

Whoever bet money on Eisler in her first round against Lieselot de Bleeckere (BEL) could be happy in the end! She won by only 2 points in an almost already lost match before squash. In the quarters, she lost against her friend and squash specialist, Astrid Reimer-Kern (GER). But with ending 6th she was pretty happy about her best WC result.

The odds against Hampl were high, as expected. If he could, he would not have bet money on himself. Nevertheless, he was determined to win against Christian Austaller (AUT) in the first round. And he prooved to have had the right mind set: only 10 point were missing in the end. In his consolation match, he did beat Alexander Barbunopulos (AUT), though.

Although, it was not possible to bet money in the +60’s category, the matches were no less thrilling. Especially the final between the name twins. In the end, Graham King could not repeat his close Swedish Open victory over Graham Cain and lost a roller-coaster match, in which Cain led 11:0 at badminton, and King 10:0 at squash, by only 3 points. Nevertheless, we can celebrate our King’s silver medal and his VICE WORLD CHAMPION title!

Susan Rutschmann took part in a seniors category as well and reached the good 5th place! In the +50 category, she beat Paule Formont (BEL) in her last match. Also congratulations to Tanja Omlin on having worked hard for her comeback after an injury. The 11th place in the Women’s B draw is already a good start and could have been even better, as she lost against Carola van Heimburg (GER) by only a single point!

Last but not least, Marcel Fässler and Jörg Schmid played in the biggest draw of the tournament. 128 player fought round for round to become world champion in the C category. Marcel Fässler won two main rounds in his first ever Racketlon tournament abroad and ended 25th by winning all of his table tennis matches. Jörg Schmid also won all of his badminton matches and ended the tournament on the 73th position. ...and 11th in the +45!!!

Congratulations to all of you and a big HURRAY once again for our VICE WORLD CHAMPION!

NE

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